"Catcher" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... celebrities in soldierships, the arts, letters, etc., and we stop there. But that is a mistake. Rank holds its court and receives its homage on every round of the ladder, from the emperor down to the rat-catcher; and distinction, also, exists on every round of the ladder, and commands its due of ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... elected Bill manager and Sadler captain. The big fellow and Dixon had discarded their suits for plain shirt and trousers, and a small collection was taken up for pants and some extra gloves. Mr. Gay gave them a catcher's mask and some bats. ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple
... he wiped his eyes with his paws. "It was the dog catcher! For I followed the wagon at a distance and I saw him put all the dogs into a big wire pen, so that none ...
— Raggedy Ann Stories • Johnny Gruelle
... and who's he speaking to, I should like to know? Shall I keep standing here? ( aside). 'Tis but indifferent architecture to make a blind dome; here's one. No, no, no; I must have a lantern. Ho, ho! That's it, hey? Here are two, sir; one will serve my turn. What art thou thrusting that thief-catcher into my face for, man? thrusted light is worse than presented pistols. i thought, sir, that you spoke to carpenter. Carpenter? why that's —but no; —a very tidy, and, I may say, an extremely gentlemanlike sort of business thou art in here, carpenter; —or would'st thou rather work in clay? ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... says, that "In presence of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, while the philosophers were making elaborate dissertations on the danger of the poison of vipers, taken inwardly, a viper catcher, who happened to be present, requested that a quantity of it might be put into a vessel; and then, with the utmost confidence, and to the astonishment of the whole company, he drank it off. Everyone expected the man instantly to drop down ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... quite at issue when they endeavour to determine what kind of instrument the vocal organ resembles; indeed, Galien compares it to a flute, Magendie to a hautboy, Despiney to a trombone, Diday to a hunting-horn, Savart to a bird-catcher's call, Biot to an organ-pipe, Malgaigne to the little instrument used by the exhibitors of Punch, and Ferrein to a spinet or harpsichord. The last-named compared the lips of the glottis to the strings of a violin; hence ...
— The Mechanism of the Human Voice • Emil Behnke
... island of Maraki—a dark-skinned, passionately jealous creature, who had followed his fortunes for three years to his present location, and then developed mal-du-pays to such an extent that the local priest and devil-catcher, one Pare-vaka, was sent for by her female attendants. Pare-vaka was not long in making his diagnosis. A little devil in the shape of an octopus was in Tene-napa's brain. And he gave instructions how to get ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... ten minutes to win her smiles and make you a declared favorite. What is it you have about you, old fellow, which wins on every one? It makes one believe in the old fable of the rat-catcher." ...
— The Northern Light • E. Werner
... not too high nor too low, and had somewhat an aquiline nose, made like the handle of a razor. He was at that time five and thirty years old or thereabouts, fine to gild like a leaden dagger—for he was a notable cheater and coney-catcher—he was a very gallant and proper man of his person, only that he was a little lecherous, and naturally subject to a kind of disease which at that time they called lack of money—it is an incomparable grief, yet, notwithstanding, he had three score ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... stupidity from thee, though I have to box thine ears in doing so," but I did not see that the old man really did box Jim's ears, or do more than pretend to frighten him, for the two understood one another perfectly well. Another time I remember hearing him call the village rat-catcher by saying, "Come hither, thou three-days-and-three-nights, thou," alluding, as I afterwards learned, to the rat-catcher's periods of intoxication; but I will tell no more of such trifles. My father's face would always brighten when old ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... that caught our notice was a fly-catcher. It was sitting on a bramble catching bees and flies, and so intently was it watching for them, that it did not even notice our presence, till Harry tried to put his hand on it, but then away it flew with ...
— Harry's Ladder to Learning - Horn-Book, Picture-Book, Nursery Songs, Nursery Tales, - Harry's Simple Stories, Country Walks • Anonymous
... lay low in the water, not so heavily sparred as the Morning Star, or with her under-cut stern, but old and battered, built for the business of a thief-catcher, and with a history as scarred as her hull and as slippery as her decks. Was she not once the Herman, and before that something else, and yet earlier something else, built for the Russians to capture the artful poachers of the Smoky Sea? And later a poacher herself, ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... is a rat-catcher," said Sprouse. "What are you doing here?" demanded Barnes, staring. He seized the man's arm and inquired eagerly: "Have you got ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... hastily got up to do honour to the superb fish, and on that occasion Fred and his father well-nigh quarrelled on the point of, "who caught the salmon!" Mr Sudberry insisting that the man who hooked the fish was the real catcher of it, and Fred scouting the ridiculous notion, and asserting that he who played and landed it was entitled to all the honour. The point was settled, however, in some incomprehensible way, without the self-denying ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... to one but he stoops; and if he stoops, and does not turn out his toes, it is impossible he can understand his author. If he is a scholar and a critic, and repeats a line as you never heard it repeated before, he must be a word-catcher. If his manner is graceful, he has studied dancing too much; but if his manner is not graceful, be sure to tell him he must go to the dancing-school. If you can discover no fault, you must prove how much better Garrick, Powel, Holland, or Barry, performed the character; and as nine-tenths ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 486 - Vol. 17, No. 486., Saturday, April 23, 1831 • Various
... time for the great Queen of Night." The day before his death he said to his wife, "Oh, that I could only once more hear my 'Flauto Magico!'" humming, in scarcely audible voice, the lively bird-catcher song. The same day, at two o'clock in the afternoon, he called his friends together, and asked for the score of his nearly completed "Requiem" to be laid on his bed. Benedict Schack sang the soprano; his brother-in-law, Hofer, the tenor; ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... killdeer, swallow, blue bird, blackbird, meadow lark, bunting, starling, redwing, purple martin, brown thresher, American goldfinch, chewink or ground robin, pewee or phoebe bird, chickadee, fly catcher, knat catcher, mouse hawk, whippoorwill, snow bird, titmouse, gull, eagle, buzzard, or any wild bird other than a game bird. No part of the plumage, skin or body of such bird shall be sold or had ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... old fox, of plundering habits, Great crauncher of fowls, great catcher of rabbits, Whom none of his sort had caught in a nap, Was finally caught in somebody's trap. By luck he escaped, not wholly and hale, For the price of his luck was the loss of his tail. Escaped in this way, to save his disgrace, He thought to get others in similar case. ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... them that, and some call them ichneumon," said the man. "Snake-catcher is what I call them, and Teddy is amazing quick on cobras. I have one here without the fangs, and Teddy catches it every night to please the folk ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... college man who had retained this emblem of his past to the final moment. Like the boots, it was much too large for little John, and hard to master, but it made a brave display, as did a red cravat, which covered his front like a baseball catcher's harness. Molly had also two sets of side-combs, gorgeously ornamented with glass diamonds, and a silver-handled tooth-brush, with which she scrubbed the lame puppy. This puppy had three legs and the mange, and he ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... is comparatively uninterested in those little distinctions which delight the caricaturist and are the essence of that much applauded quality, "the catching of a likeness." I don't believe he was a very good catcher of likenesses, but I am sure his rendering was the biggest and fullest side of that man—there is always a fine ironical appreciation of character moulded by circumstance; whereas in Velasquez I find the ...
— The Mind of the Artist - Thoughts and Sayings of Painters and Sculptors on Their Art • Various
... to-day. For one package it costs ten cents. When we played ball against the east side we only had 6 boys and they had twelve. We have a base ball team, and I am Captain, so you see I need a suit. Gretchen and Mother are playing backgammon with one dice. I catch sometimes when our real catcher is not there. When he is there I play first ...
— How To Study and Teaching How To Study • F. M. McMurry
... except Atta-Culla-Culla, are less than six feet in height "without their moccasins." Squatted as they are gravely around the council-fire, they present a most picturesque appearance. Among them are the Bread-Slave-Catcher, noted for his exploits in stealing negroes; the Tennassee Warrior, prince of the town of that name; Noon-Day, a wide-awake brave; Bloody Fellow, whose subsequent exploits will show the appropriateness of his name; Old Tassell, a wise ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... Catcher then said 'Look behind.' I looked behind, and there on the seat was strapped a larger cake. This contained ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, November 24, 1920 • Various
... with the girl, whose butter he was determined to have even if he must pay her own price for it. Like the Reeve in the Canterbury Tales, who "ever rode the hinderest of the rout," being such a rogue and such a rogue-catcher that he could not bear anybody behind his back, Bruce, when about the business that his soul loved, eschewed the presence of any ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... aid of all the books in the library, old Dunn, the rat-catcher of Arranakilty, a man profoundly versed in the habits of rodents and birds, Larry the groom, and sundry others of low estate but high intelligence in matters of ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... Pennsylvania act to be invalid. And without relying on any principle, without any discussion of, or the slightest allusion to, any authorities or the great fundamental questions involved in that issue, he coolly depicted the inconveniences the slave-catcher might be subject to in States where there was but one District Judge, and how essentially he would be aided by the State legislation; and pointed out to his brethren those "consequences" which they did "not contemplate" and to which they "did not suppose the opinion ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... feet through the West River Bridge, with the narrer-gage comin' in on one side, an' the Montreal flyer the other, an' the old bridge teeterin' between?" said the Deacon. "Kin you put your nose down on the cow-catcher of a locomotive when you're waitin' at the depot an' let 'em play 'Curfew shall not ring to-night' ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... well-known lady-artist, who in middle life suggested to him the figure of Lona Hessel, was in later years the model for the Rat-Wife. There is no inconsistency between these two accounts of the matter. The idea was doubtless suggested by his recollection of the rat-catcher of Skien, while traits of manner and physiognomy might be borrowed from the ...
— Little Eyolf • Henrik Ibsen
... care for me a bit," she said once. "I am only another form of 'ze sensation'—like going up in a balloon or riding on the cow-catcher." ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... modest young men out on my own lines, then," laughed the coach. Calling to one of the juniors to stand behind him as catcher, Luce continued: ...
— The High School Pitcher - Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond • H. Irving Hancock
... the herons, mud-hens, sandpipers, and curlews are marsh and shore birds that feed and wade in the shallow salt water, and nest on the banks or, like the heron, in trees near the bay. The heron is a frog-catcher, and he will stand very still on his long legs and patiently wait till the frog, thinking him gone, swims near. Then one dart of the long bill captures froggy, and the heron waits for another. You know the red-head, green mallard, canvas-back, and small teal ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton
... I have to give orders about my new bridle and saddle-cloth, and speak to the rat-catcher about his dogs: Miss Grey ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... that some day," hissed Dalzell, as, with heightened color, he made his way to catcher's post of ...
— Dick Prescotts's Fourth Year at West Point - Ready to Drop the Gray for Shoulder Straps • H. Irving Hancock
... Carver, they say, that has the oil of Rhodium for them; for they follow and fawn on him, like rats on the rat catcher—of all sorts and sizes, he has 'em. They say, he sets them over and after one another; and has lations of them that he lets out on the craturs' cabins, to larn how many grains of salt every man takes with ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... The Rat-catcher was supposed to have the art of drawing rats after him by his whistle, ...
— Faust • Goethe
... Schickaneder, like himself, was a Freemason; he had been his companion in dissipation, and exercised a great influence over him. Mozart at last consented. A compact was made, and Schickaneder set to work on the libretto. As he was a popular buffoon, he invented the part of Papageno, the bird-catcher, for himself, and arranged that it should be dressed in a costume of feathers. It is a trivial part, but Schickaneder intended to tickle the fancy of the public, and succeeded. The first act was finished, when it was found that the same subject ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... in Mauprat. We have Marcasse, the mole-catcher, and Patience, the good-natured Patience, the rustic philosopher, well up in Epictetus and in Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who has gone into the woods to live his life according to the laws of Nature and to find the wisdom of the ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... to burn poor children in their beds? So he turned round, and struck his sword upon the floor, and asked me whether I was one of them—'Who are you then?' and I—all my courage went away, and I answered, I was a poor rat-catcher. 'A rat-catcher, are you? Well then, Mr Rat-catcher, when you are killing rats, if you find a nest of young ones, don't you kill them too? Or do you leave them to grow, and become mischievous, eh?'—'I kill the young ones, of course,' replied I. 'Well, so do ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... said His Majesty, "let Us see this brigand-catcher who excels the redoubtable Contra Guerrillas.—As I live, the young man is a Chasseur d'Afrique! Step nearer, sir, and tell Us who ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... him. A thin, pure type. He was dressed in field glasses and a bag full of green weeds and stout walking boots. There was an ecstatic glint in his eye which meant that he had discovered a long-billed, yellow-tailed Peruvian fly-catcher, "very ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... your compliments,' he cried gruffly. 'It was with sweet words that you did coax my fingers into that fool-catcher of yours. Now, here is my old headpiece of Spanish steel. It has, as you can see, one or two dints of blows, and a fresh one will not hurt it. I place it here upon this oaken stool high enough to be within fair sword-sweep. Have at it, Junker, and let us see ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... snatched from the crane, the top piece flies up as described, and a parallel short joist at the bottom of the pouch drops. The pouch is strapped small in the middle, resembling an hour-glass, where the catcher-iron on the car is to strike it. This "catcher" consists of a round iron bar across the door of the car, and placed in a socket on each side about shoulder high; a strong handle, similar to a chisel-handle, projects perpendicularly from this bar; on the under side ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. 1, Issue 1. - A Massachusetts Magazine of Literature, History, - Biography, And State Progress • Various
... taking up the empty bottle, he dashed it against the woodwork of the sofa and broke it to pieces. "Who was he?" he went on, in increasing rage; "a chaffering jack-pudding. I have made him what he is, the noodle. If I whistle, he dances; he is only the decoy, I am the bird-catcher." Here Hippus tried to whistle a tune, and to execute a few steps. Again the cold sweat rained from his brow, and, taking out his handkerchief, he dried his face, and carefully replaced the rag in his pocket. "He does not return," he suddenly ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... Wasp found in La Plata, the Monedula punctata, as described by Hudson (Naturalist in La Plata, pp. 162-164), is an adroit fly-catcher, and thus supplies her grub with fresh food, carefully covering the mouth of the hole with loose earth after each visit; as many as six or seven freshly-killed insects may be found for the use ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay
... easily the motor-driven fan sucked in everything in sight. I held the nozzle near a fly on the window pane and zipp—p-p, in went Mr. Fly. I thought right away that a big vacuum cleaner would make a fine moth catcher if we could only get near enough to the moths. And I even figured out a plan for a large one which wouldn't cost very much and could be made mostly of wood. But I knew it was foolish 'cause we couldn't get ...
— The Boy Scout Fire Fighters • Irving Crump
... Rule is to be refused till all the prophets of evil are refuted, Ireland must go without Home Rule for ever. "If the sky fall, we shall catch larks." But he would be a foolish bird-catcher who waited for that contingency. And not less foolish is the statesman who sits still till every conceivable objection to his policy has been mathematically refuted in advance, and every wild prediction falsified by the event; for that would ensure his never moving at all. Sedet aeternumque ...
— Handbook of Home Rule (1887) • W. E. Gladstone et al.
... slowly, "I wouldn't give the job of dog-catcher to a man you couldn't trust to stand by ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... I could stock you from my place, an' I'd stuff you with 'em. I can grow 'em 'ere for next to nothing, but they cost a heap o' money in furrin ports, an' your crimson wave-catcher ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... lighting lamps and drawing shades or meeting the masculine population at front gates with babies in their arms or beau-catcher curls set on their cheeks with deadly intent. Negro cooks were hustling suppers on their smoking stoves, and one of the doves that lives up in the vines under the eaves of my home moaned out and was answered by one from under the vines that grow over the gables at the Crittendens'. I haven't ...
— Over Paradise Ridge - A Romance • Maria Thompson Daviess
... wild grapes and the berries of the Virginia creeper—sometimes also seen busily scooping out a big hole on the rosy side of a tempting apple in the orchard. Some observers say the catbird eats the eggs of the fly-catcher and other birds, but this must be seen ...
— Some Spring Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell
... could. Just as I lost strength, my hand touched a cask lashed to a grating that must have fallen from some vessel, or been thrown from it. That held me up till morning. By that time I was about all in. But just then a sloop—a turtle catcher she was—bore down on me, sighted me, and answered my frantic appeal, and picked me up. It was ...
— Doubloons—and the Girl • John Maxwell Forbes
... never seen an otter, even in a museum, he was delighted with this episode of his early walk. "Come," said he, quite touched when the old man walked away without asking him for a compensation, "you say you are a famous otter catcher. If you are sure there is an ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... of parents and husbands, these people appear to admit no kind of superiority among one another, except a certain degree of superstitious reverence for their angetkooks, and their tacitly following the counsel or steps of the most active seal-catcher on their hunting excursions. The word nallegak, used in Greenland to express "master," and "lord" in the Esquimaux translations of the Scriptures, they were not acquainted with. One of the young men at Winter Island appeared to be considered somewhat in the light of a servant ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... this game you must first decide which one of you is to be the Bird-catcher; the other players then each choose the name of a bird, but no one must choose the owl, as it is forbidden. All the players then sit in a circle with their hands on their knees, except the Bird-catcher, who stands ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... of Taylor will recall the deceptiveness of this outward appearance. It concealed muscles of steel and a will that had only to be right in order to be invincible. He was the peer of any amateur baseball catcher in his day, and held the same enviable place as a student of the classics. He was the strong man for the D.K.E. initiations, and took the same rank ...
— Jukes-Edwards - A Study in Education and Heredity • A. E. Winship
... not bad, Stoliker; and I really believe there's some grit in you, if you are a man-catcher. Still, you were not in very much danger, as perhaps you knew. Now, if you should want this pistol again, just watch where it alights." And Yates, taking the weapon by the muzzle, tossed it as far as he could ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... the oesophagus, and are best removed by means of an instrument known as a "coin-catcher", which is passed beyond the coin, and on being withdrawn catches it in a hinged flange. In emergencies a loop of stout silver wire bent so as to form a hook makes an ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... rival, and one in more direct competition with herself. This was Sam Cowell, a music-hall "star" from England. A comedian of genuine talent, he took America by storm with a couple of ballads, "The Rat-Catcher's Daughter" and "Villikins and his Dinah." The public flocked to hear him in their thousands. Lola's lectures fell very flat. Even fresh material and reduced prices failed to serve as a lure. The position was ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... locomotive whistle, trumpeted loudly and then, lowering his head, charged the oncoming train. The impact was tremendous. Such was the impetus of the great pachyderm that the engine was partially derailed, the front of the smoke-box shattered as far as the tubes, the cow-catcher was crushed into a shapeless piece of iron, and other damages of minor importance were sustained. The train was going thirty-four miles per hour, and the engine alone weighed between forty and ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... calme, dishonourable, vile submission: Alla stucatho carries it away. Tybalt, you Rat-catcher, will you walke? Tib. What wouldst thou haue with me? Mer. Good King of Cats, nothing but one of your nine liues, that I meane to make bold withall, and as you shall vse me hereafter dry beate the rest of the eight. Will you pluck your Sword out of his Pilcher by ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... for there are fifteen species; one hundred and twelve cormorants, forty-nine gannets, one hundred and forty terns, two hundred and eighty-seven kingfishers, beside storks, herons, spoonbills, penguins, albatrosses, and a host of others; mollusks for the oyster-catcher, turnstone, and other birds. ...
— The Deluge in the Light of Modern Science - A Discourse • William Denton
... Moore. Mr. Tait informs me that it grows plentifully on the sides of dry hills near Oporto, and that vast numbers of flies adhere to the leaves. This latter fact is well-known to the villagers, who call the plant the "fly-catcher, " and hang it up in their cottages for this purpose. A plant in my hot-house caught so many insects during the early part of April, although the weather was cold and insects scarce, that it must have been in some manner strongly attractive to them. On ...
— Insectivorous Plants • Charles Darwin
... salvation." Will it not, therefore, be the duty of the Southern clergy to extend those blessings to new millions of Africans, and thus carry out the "plans of Divine Providence?" Is the whole tendency of this argument not to elevate the horrible trade of the slave-catcher to the same high level with the noble office of the missionary? Proclaiming as they do that the capture of Africans and their removal into slavery in the Southern States is God's own missionary plan, the Confederate clergy and people will consider it as ...
— Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky • Jacob D. Green
... and owl, curlew and crested hern, Kingfisher, mallard, water-rail and tern, Chaffinch and greenfinch, warbler, stonechat, ruff, Pied wagtail, robin, fly-catcher and chough, Missel-thrush, magpie, sparrow-hawk, and jay, Built, those far ages gone, in this year's way. And the first man who walked the cliffs of Rame, As I this year, looked down and saw the same Blotches of rusty red on ...
— Georgian Poetry 1918-19 • Various
... "Cow-catcher," I suggested eagerly, and we continued in this ecstatic duet for some time. Then I asked him what it was all about, and he told me. He explained the ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... for the rifles of the sportsmen and the sling-shots of small boys. As if sufficient attention were not attracted to it by its plumage, it must needs keep up a noisy, guttural rattle, ker-r-ruck, ker-r-ruck, very like a tree-toad's call, and flit about among the trees with the restlessness of a fly-catcher. Yet, in spite of these invitations for a shot to the passing gunner, it still multiplies in districts where nuts abound, being "more common than the robin" about Washington, ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... famishing with hunger; the seed was so attractive, and he who had baited the trap knew it full well, and that the bird could not resist its appetite. The fowler is our Lord. The bait is Divine Love. The bird is the soul. O skillful catcher of souls! O irresistible bait of Divine Love! O pitiable victim! but most blessed soul; for in the hands of our Lord the soul only dies to self to be ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... experienced hands, and Ned was almost certain to be put out. However, he had chanced it. It was too late to go back now. He was running straight for home, as though there was no such thing as a baseman with a ball close behind him, waiting for a good chance to throw to the catcher ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... A long list of four- footed beasts is also included in the definition of "vermine," and rates ranging from a shilling for a fox to a halfpenny for a mole were established. [Footnote: Lambarde, Office of Distributers, etc., 92.] The mole-catcher was a regular employe of some parishes. [Footnote: Hist. MSS. Commission, Report III., App., 331; ...
— European Background Of American History - (Vol. I of The American Nation: A History) • Edward Potts Cheyney
... "Yes, and wonderful catcher!" said Dorothy. "Just think how he caught us—Ugh! It makes me shiver to think of being tossed in the air over those black, raging waves. We must have looked like little bundles flying from the ship. Wasn't Jack ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... distract our attention. He is not an artist but a watchman. If you look into the buddleia-tree beside him, you will see his hen moving about in silence, creeping, dancing, fluttering, as she gorges herself with insects. She is a fly-catcher at this season, leaping into the air and pirouetting as she seizes her prey and returns to the bough. She is restless and is not content with the spoil of a single tree. She flings herself gracefully, like a ballet-dancer, into the plum, and takes up a caterpillar ...
— The Pleasures of Ignorance • Robert Lynd
... other nabbed bodily and thrown into the Styx. In consequence of this they obtain damages from the city. The city then decides to bring suit against the state. The bench consists of Apollyon himself and Judge Blackstone; Coke appears for the city, Catiline for the state. The first dog-catcher, called to testify, and asked whether he is familiar with dogs, replies in the affirmative, adding that he had never got quite so intimate with one ...
— Cerberus, The Dog of Hades - The History of an Idea • Maurice Bloomfield
... everybody, turned into polkas and quadrilles and in fact to become for the time one of the institutions of this great and intelligent country. I remember how, a year or two since, that contemptible Rat-catcher's Daughter, without a thing to recommend it, with no music, no wit, no sentiment, nothing but vulgar brutality, might be heard in every separate town of England and Scotland, sung about the streets by every ragged urchin; while the other songs of the vivacious Cowell fell dead from his lips. The ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... life can be traced in his Short Studies. But he had not been reared in a literary atmosphere. He had been brought up among horses and dogs, with grooms and keepers, on the moors and the sea. He describes it himself as "the old wild scratch way, when the keeper was the rabbit-catcher, and sporting was enjoyed more for the adventure than for the bag." He never lost his love of sport, and he gave his own son the same training he had himself. Even in his last illness he liked the young man to go out shooting, and always asked what ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... plate with the bat held in his right hand, handle downward, which was the signal for the squeeze play. But Wyndham had known what was coming quite as well as Oakdale, and Newbert, pitching the ball beyond the batsman's reach, gave the catcher every chance to get the runner as he came lunging ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... the cause of the conflagration, and, in place of recognising, like the rest of the world, that the moist straw had taken fire of its own accord, they suspected that it was a case of revenge. It proceeded, no doubt, from Maitre Gouy, or perhaps from the mole-catcher. Six months before Bouvard had refused to accept his services, and even maintained, before a circle of listeners, that his trade was a baneful one, and that the government ought to prohibit it. Since that time the man prowled about the locality. He wore ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... It happened, while his passions were in full force, that a rat-catcher arrived at Mowbray Hall; which at that time was greatly infested by the large Norway rats. The man had the art of taking them alive, and was accordingly employed by the Squire. While he was preparing to perform his business, ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... we might have made this noted bandit prisoner if we had only known!" exclaimed Lawrence, who seemed more distressed at missing the chance of becoming an amateur thief-catcher than at misdirected charity. "But do you really think the fellow was ...
— The Rover of the Andes - A Tale of Adventure on South America • R.M. Ballantyne
... between the front of the engine and our car had a long iron bar, sort of, and they had one end of it fixed in a sort of coupling just above the cow-catcher. It was pretty hard keeping us off the platform, so we saw everything they did. The other end of that bar they held up so it stuck out like a shaft, and then the engine moved about an inch, then stopped, then ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... the skittles dance again, and bang goes the bowl at her sconce instead of the skittles: it vas lucky for her it did not hit her, for if it had, I'll be d———d if ever she'd a cried Buy my live flounders any more—he vas at play vith Sam Stripe the tailor; so the flea-catcher he jumps in between 'em, and being a piece-botcher, he thought he could be peace-maker, but it voudn't do, tho' he jump'd about like a parch'd pea in a frying-pan—Poll called him Stitch louse, bid him pick ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... in the box and was putting some swift ones over the plate. As yet he did not have perfect control of the horsehide, and as a consequence it occasionally went over the catcher's head. ...
— The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck - Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields • Edward Stratemeyer
... from the Rinser to the yard; and he will have to look out sharp, or some of those strong, young sheep will throw him. Fact, I think I will name Nell, who is pretty nimble and strong, Assistant Catcher. She is to help hold and pull them along to the tub—and pick Catcher up, if he gets thrown. Wealthy may be Sheep-Hole-Tender; she must guard the sheep-hole and open and close it with the spruce bush, as ordered by the Catcher ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... Scotland's many famous names. Considering the noble hospitality and manly character of Nathan Johnson, I have felt that he, better than I, illustrated the virtues of the great Scottish chief. Sure I am, that had any slave-catcher entered his domicile, with a view to molest any one of his household, he would have shown himself like him of ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... broad bottoms along the creek you get glimpses of the catbird feasting on the grapes and the wild plums; the brown thrasher and the woodthrush, wholly silent now; the little house wren who has lost her chatter; the vireos and the orioles, the wood pewee, the crested fly catcher and the kingbird. They all seem to be going southward. There are a few nests and young birds in the early part of the month—the yellow-billed cuckoo, the Savannah sparrow, the goldfinch. But these are exceptions to the ...
— Some Summer Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell
... the details of explanation with the greatest animation. He showed all the attitudes of pitcher and catcher and batter in the real game, and gave a dramatic description of a wonderful "hot ball" he had seen caught on the glorious occasion on which he had witnessed a match in company with Mr. Hobbs. His vigorous, graceful little ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... as a Weevil the strange Acorn Balaninus, the only one among her victims that wears a long pipe-stem. I leave to evolutionism, atavism and other transcendental "isms" the honour and also the risk of explaining what I humbly recognize as being too far beyond my grasp. Because the son of the bird-catcher who imitates the call of his victims has been fed on roast Robins, Linnets and Chaffinches, shall we hastily conclude that this education through the stomach will enable him later, without other initiation than that of the spit, to know his ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... her husband wrathfully. "She is sitting on the cow-catcher of each and every train, and if I'm not there to meet her she'll disinherit me. Haven't you ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... the stairs to his room and found Ling Chu polishing the meagre stock of silver which Tarling possessed. Ling Chu was a thief-catcher and a great detective, but he had also taken upon himself the business of attending to Tarling's personal comfort. The detective spoke no word, out went straight to the cupboard where he kept his foreign kit. On a shelf in neat array and carefully folded, ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace
... wretch. He is always asking for work, and his health is that of a dying fish. The washerman is neighbour to the crocodile. His food is mixed up with his clothes, and every member of him is unclean. The catcher of water-fowl, even though he dive in the Nile, may catch nothing. The trade of the fisherman is the worst of all. He is in blind terror of the crocodile, and falleth among crocodiles." The text continues with a few further remarks on the honourable ...
— The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians • E. A. Wallis Budge
... the ferrets," said Bob, in a hoarse treble voice, as he shuffled along, keeping his blue eyes fixed on the river, like an amphibious animal who foresaw occasion for darting in. "He lives up the Kennel Yard at Sut Ogg's, he does. He's the biggest rot-catcher anywhere, he is. I'd sooner, be a rot-catcher nor anything, I would. The moles is nothing to the rots. But Lors! you mun ha' ferrets. Dogs is no good. Why, there's that dog, now!" Bob continued, pointing with ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... the elements of a happy, contented, harmonious life? No; instead, either a speedy lawsuit for divorce, or a continual domestic broil, the nearest approach to a mundane purgatory possible. The selfish, close-fisted, miserly money-catcher must marry a woman equally sordid and stingy. Then together they could hoard up, for moths and rust to destroy, or for interested relatives to quarrel over, the pictorial greenback and the glittering dollar, each scrimping the other down to the finest point above starvation and freezing, ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... from the young man, and had been waiting for him with the cool complacency of a bird-catcher, who, having arranged all his lines and snares, stands with folded arms until his feathered victims fall into his net. The line that he had displayed before the young man's eyes was the sight of liberty. ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... crane, paler than a ghost, wading in the grassy shallows. She saw the ravening garfish leap from the bayou, and the mullet in shining hundreds spatter away to left and right; and the fisherman and the shrimp-catcher in their canoes come gliding up the glassy stream, riding down the water-lilies, that rose again behind and shook the drops from their crowns, like water-sprites. Here and there, farther out, she saw the ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... he was skimming along the streets, he happened to see a great number of these very Birds, imprisoned in a cage, on the shoulders of a bird-catcher. "Unhappy wretches!" said he, "you now feel the punishment of your former neglect. But those who, having no foresight of their own, despise the wholesome admonition of their friends, deserve the mischiefs which their own obstinacy or ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... common Oyster-Catcher of Europe, two species have lately been added to the genus, namely, H. palliatus, Temm., a native of Brazil, and H. niger, Cuv., from New Holland. The bird above described approaches more closely to the European species (H. ostralegus) than to the other two; but may be distinguished ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... Minister and the Fairy. The Fisherman and the Merman. The Laird O' Co'. Ewen of the Little Head. Jock and his Mother. Saint Columba. The Mermaid Wife. The Fiddler and the Bogle of Bogandoran. Thomas the Rhymer. Fairy Friends. The Seal-Catcher's Adventure. The Fairies of Merlin's Craig. Rory Macgillivray. The Haunted Ships. The Brownie. Mauns' Stane. "Horse and Hattock." Secret Commonwealth. The Fairy Boy of Leith. The Dracae. Lord Tarbat's ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... inconceivable. In what respect, I pray, can this statement be strengthened by any reasoning about the nature and distinctive essence of miracles 'in abstracto'? What purpose can be answered by any pretended definition of a miracle? If I met with a disputatious word-catcher, or logomachist, who sought to justify his unbelief on this ground, I should not hesitate to say—"Never mind whether it is a miracle or no. Call it what you will;—but do you believe the fact? Do you believe that Christ did by force of his will and word multiply instantaneously ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... behind and gagged him with the loose end of the rope; and Tybee held the candle to light the knotting of it. And so they marched him out, with Tybee muttering between his teeth that it was rat-catcher's work, and no soldier's, this killing of vermin, and bidding his men ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... thinking, and without whose discernment, sagacity, skill and directing ability, the twirler would make a pitiful show of himself. There are pitchers who recognize this fact and have the generosity to acknowledge it; but in most cases, especially with youngsters, no matter how much he may owe to the catcher, the slab-man takes all the credit, and fancies he ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott |
